World warned to manage its expectations over G20

Euronews

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has said he does not expect major results from this weekend’s meeting of 20 nations in Washington to discuss the global financial crisis.

Speaking at a news conference with Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, Lula da Silva, who is acting President of the G20, warned that the November 15 summit is only the beginning of finding an answer to the problem.

“We will certainly not find solutions and certainly none of these countries has a solution and possibly we are not the 20 nations that are going to find a solution in a single meeting,” he said.

“Our way out has to be global. This situation means that we also think about change in multilateral institutions which have lost much of their representativeness in the last years.”

UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown urged the G20 to provide impetus for a new world trade deal, along with reform of the global financial system.

“I have got no doubt that if we can get a trade deal, that that will send a very important signal against protectionism and I have been following this very closely, talking to all the different partners and there is very little now that divides the countries that are there to make a trade deal,” he said.

G20 officials and central bankers agreed in Sao Paolo last week that expansionary fiscal measures are needed to ward off the threat of a global recession.